News

There’s no need to build the case for cross-channel marketing because it’s already top of mind for a majority of marketers. But cross-channel initiatives still face challenges, including budget constraints, lack of technical expertise and staffing.

A commissioned study, “The Key To Successful Cross-Channel Marketing,” conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of ExactTarget, highlights how marketers are preparing for cross-channel marketing. The greatest challenges, according to the report, are understanding customer behavior and managing multichannel execution.

 
Marketing automation vendor Marketo today announced that it has released a new framework for linking third-party applications to its core marketing software platform.

The framework, called Webhooks, is described by the company as a "push technology" that links Marketo to customer-facing and sales applications. Buyer behavior tracked using the Marketo platform, for example, could be leveraged via Webhooks to trigger a new product-activation code for a customer, send an SMS notification to a sales rep, serve a personalized banner ad, or perform other real-time tasks.

Return Path, a provider of email delivery and intelligence services, announced last week that it had acquired Montreal-based firm Context.IO.  Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Context.IO develops API interfaces between email data stores and business applications. Return Path will use the acquisition to give enterprise developers better access to email for data-mining and marketing intelligence activities.

InfoArmy announced this week that it had raised $17.3 million in Series B funding to finance the company's data-as-a-service competitive intelligence service. The funding was announced at the CrowdConf 2012 event.

InfoArmy describes itself as "crowdsourced competitive intelligence" aimed primarily at sales and marketing organizations. The company recruits independent researchers to assemble competitive intelligence reports on companies; researchers are compensated using a revenue-sharing model.

Marketing automation vendor Eloqua, fresh off its recent IPO, announced its third quarter 2012 results Wednesday afternoon, including 30% year-over-year revenue growth.

According to the company, total revenue for Q3 of 2012 was a record $23.8 million, compared to $18.3 million in the third quarter of 2011. This includes $21.6 million in subscription and support revenue, reflecting an increase of 32% from Q3 2011. The company also reported $2.2 million in professional services revenue, up 12% from Q3 2011.